Episode 3
Bridging Science and Longevity Care – A Vision for the Future
“We want people to be really functional and enjoying life… right up until the end.”
Key Takeaways
Science-Backed Longevity Care – Dr. Julie Chen stresses the importance of rigorous, evidence-based research in longevity care, ensuring measurable health outcomes and institutional support.
Collaboration with Conventional Medicine – Longevity care complements, not replaces, traditional medicine, fostering partnerships like with Massachusetts General Hospital to create a more holistic healthcare model.
Quotable Moments
“We want people to be really functional and enjoying life… right up until the end.”
“Only by growing in parallel—symbiotic and complementary—can we ensure this medicine benefits people the most.”
“For longevity care to succeed, we need science, insurance buy-in, and mutual respect across medical disciplines.”
Introduction
As we push the boundaries of human lifespan, the focus is shifting not just to living longer but also to living better. Dr. Julie Chen, a leading advocate for integrative medicine, emphasizes the role of rigorous science in advancing longevity care and narrowing the gap between lifespan and health span. In a recent discussion, Dr. Chen provided a compelling vision of how science and collaboration can transform the future of healthcare.
The Role of Science in Longevity Care
Longevity care is rooted in evidence-based practices, and for Dr. Chen, this means a commitment to rigorous scientific research. She shared that her organization has contributed to over 60 peer-reviewed journal articles, underscoring their dedication to advancing the field.
Unlike sensationalist approaches, longevity care demands measurable outcomes, such as tracking how specific interventions influence a person’s clinical trajectory. This evidence-based methodology is critical not only for improving individual health but also for gaining institutional buy-in, from insurance providers to government bodies.
Health Span vs. Lifespan
One of the key challenges in longevity care is bridging the gap between health span (the years of good health) and lifespan. Dr. Chen envisions a future where individuals remain active and vibrant throughout their lives, avoiding the decline that often marks the last decade. She described this goal as essential to enabling people to “travel, have fun, and exercise right up until the end.”
This shift requires more than personal conviction. It demands systemic changes, supported by scientific validation, to encourage broader acceptance and integration of longevity practices within mainstream medicine.
A Symbiotic Relationship with Conventional Medicine
Dr. Chen was quick to clarify that longevity care does not aim to replace conventional medicine but to complement it. She acknowledged the unparalleled value of conventional medicine in addressing acute and life-threatening conditions, while emphasizing the need for a collaborative approach to improve chronic care and long-term health.
The partnership between her organization and Massachusetts General Hospital exemplifies this collaborative spirit. By integrating longevity care with the gold standard of conventional medicine, they aim to create a model that is symbiotic and sustainable.
A Vision for Democratized Longevity Care
For longevity care to succeed, it must be accessible to everyone. This democratization requires widespread support from the medical community and institutions. Dr. Chen highlighted the importance of bridging gaps between different medical disciplines, fostering mutual respect, and ensuring open communication.
Such integration, she argued, will allow patients to benefit from “the best of both worlds” without being caught in the crossfire of conflicting ideologies.
Dr. Julie Chen’s insights underscore the transformative potential of longevity care when supported by robust science and collaboration. By narrowing the gap between health span and lifespan, and fostering partnerships across medical disciplines, the future of healthcare promises a better quality of life for all.
The road ahead is one of unity—where conventional and integrative medicine work hand in hand, ensuring that longevity care not only survives but thrives for generations to come.
Dr. Julie Chen’s work exemplifies the transformative power of integrative and precision medicine. Her dedication to bridging traditional care with innovative solutions inspires a new vision for healthcare—one where proactive, patient-centered care takes center stage.
Stay tuned for more insights as we continue to explore groundbreaking advancements in medicine and health innovation!
Transcript
00:01
Dafne Canales
Human longevity is very rooted in science. And you talked about some studies and I think there’s over 20 different scientific journals and papers that’s been written by your leadership team. Tell me a little bit about the science behind human longevity.
00:15
Dr. Julie Chen
Absolutely. It’s. Yeah. And to your point, it’s actually 60 plus peer reviewed journal articles. And it’s quite a bit because we are so steeped in science. I think one thing that is so important to human longevity is that, you know, we actually have talked about this. It’s not about sensationalism, it’s about the science of it. And so for us to have that, we would have to have studies. We would want to really track someone’s health over time and look at whether if we did implement something, whether that intervention actually changed the clinical course. Right. That’s what kind of evidence medicine really looks at. And then isolating certain factors to see what’s significant or not. So science to us is important in the sense that if we are truly to change medicine, which we really want to, in the sense.
01:03
Dr. Julie Chen
Not that again, I don’t want to say that conventional medicine is bad. It’s not. But for certain key factors like for trauma and acute issues or life threatening issues, conventional medicine is, there’s nothing better than that. But when were looking at longevity care and we are nowadays living longer and we want that kind of health span and lifespan gap to actually be narrow, meaning we want people to be really functional and enjoying life, traveling and having fun and exercising right up until they, whenever their life ends, instead of it being like the last 10 years, they’re sickly, like we don’t want that. So we want to close that gap between health span and lifespan.
01:41
Dr. Julie Chen
We really need to have the science to help support not just people’s internal beliefs that this is important because we want that as well, but also to change the community of medicine to understand that this is important. Meaning we need ultimately to democratize this. We need insurance buy in, we need government buy in, we need other health care institutions to acknowledge the importance of this, things like that. And that really can’t happen in medicine unless you have strong science. I will say, I think because of the fact that we have, we are so robust in science.
02:16
Dr. Julie Chen
This also explains why we’re co branded with Mass General and Mass General is such a strong historical entity of the of science and standard of care that you know, I do think it speaks volumes that they are co branding with us and working with us and we have this partnership where we can see this kind of medicine continue to grow. And I do think it’s important for us to do that with conventional care, because only by doing that can we grow in parallel where symbiotic and complementary. Because if you try to split off and do things completely differently, and there’s no communication, ultimately this is not the kind of medicine that will be able to be survivable in the field of science and medicine, nor will it benefit people the most if two arenas of medicine and are conflicting or at odds.
03:04
Dr. Julie Chen
So I think the ultimate way for all, everybody to really benefit from this kind of medicine in the future is for us to be able to have an understanding and a mutual respect in all of the versions of medicine together, so that patients in the future, clients, people, can utilize the best of both worlds without there being some sort of conflict that one side is not talking to the other or not believing in the other.
